President Obama attends a serious ceremony Thursday at the World Trade Center in New York City: Despite the gruesome circumstances of his killing, some say it's OK to joke about Osama bin Laden. Mario Tama/Getty Images

May 5, 2011

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The killing of Osama bin Laden has stirred up painful memories of 9/11 and spurred President Obama to place a wreath at New York's World Trade Center site to honor victims of the attacks. Yet within hours of the raid that killed bin Laden, jokes about the al Qaeda leader's demise erupted on the internet and late-night TV. (David Letterman: "At least bin Laden lived to see the royal wedding.") Is it cathartic to laugh about something as deadly serious as the shooting of a terrorist blamed for killing thousands of innocent people? (Watch Jimmy Kimmel's bin Laden Real Housewives spoof.)

And other jokes were just tasteless: "A case can be made for laughing in the face of darkness as a way to overcome obstacles, for sure," says Brenna Ehrlich at Mashable, "but there do seem to be some cases where the revelry can go too far." For example, Next Media Animation released one of its bizarre computer-animated videos on Monday "depicting bin Laden's gruesome death, soldiers urinating on his body, and, finally, his spirit being gang-raped by pigs." The video has been yanked."Too soon? Osama bin Laden memes abound"